Edit: I misunderstood the person's position. I think others might have as well, so I'm leaving up my response to an idea that unjust wars make vigilantism necessary/moral. However, as near as I can tell that their actual position isn't "people should be able to kill outside a war", it's "why should people ever think killing is moral".

Russia IS being opposed by to the tune of billions of dollars of support and widespread condemnation for their war of aggression including meaningful economic sanctions and asset seizures. It's facilitated the killing of just under 700,000 Russian soldiers and tons of equipment according to the Ukrainian government. The only reason NATO won't deploy troops is because no one wants WW3. Nations are even now considering escalating their support following the deployment of North Koreans.

Israel IS being opposed by huge swathes of the world. If the US (and to a lesser extent other Western countries) weren't providing diplomatic and military cover for them, they'd have been censured in the UN for decades now and potentially stopped. Long story short, the US is just as at fault for the genocide as Israel due to providing the diplomatic/military means via decades of "blank check" support. US policy doesn't mean that civilians should start killing Zionists in America and abroad.

I'm not a warmonger, quite the opposite. I won't take the stance that civilians should believe they have the moral obligation to murder other civilians because wars are sometimes unjust. There are unjust trials. Doesn't mean people shouldn't have the right to a trial before they're killed. There are bad politicians, doesn't mean all politics should be banned. There are bad marriages. There are bad police. There are bad doctors.

Historically it's leaders like presidents, governors, legislative bodies, and generals. Not forum posts.

No worries. War is unavoidable at times - dictators exist, people get desperate, and so on. There are legalities involved, and they are a concern but aren't my main concern. Morally, there's a difference to me between killing someone because I hate them and killing someone because I'm a combatant and so are they. There are strict rules to war that help are supposed to keep things largely ethical - I understand war is never going to be "clean". Policies like rules of engagement, being able to surrender, treatment of POWs, genuinely avoiding targetting civilians (the world could use more of that right now) and stopping when your country tells you to all matter to me.

Soldiers are not asked to make decisions about who they'll kill (I mean which armies, not rules of engagement), so the individuals are not being relied upon to determine justice. That is a big difference from vigilantism, where a person or mob of people decides who lives and dies. Ideally the leaders of the military and country are making sure war is a necessary last resort and conducted according to rules, and if that isn't happening then other nations should be condemning and opposing them. It's like how I think nations need prisons, but I don't think I should be allowed to take someone hostage because I'm pretty sure they deserve it.

Ok, I have those thoughts sometimes too, especially when I'm angry and hopeless. I usually cut them off because ultimately I don't think I have the right to kill people outside of the context of a war etc. But there's nothing illegal about thinking. Clarence Darrow: “I've never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure".

A lot of folks are calling for actual violence though. It's all over the thread. Incitement is different than just wishing Trump and his cronies would croak.

In a nutshell

In a nutshell you don't understand effective resistance, just violence. Your whole 1st paragraph is little more than torture porn - likely because you can't argue with my specific points intellectually so you want to appeal to extremes of emotion.

Think. What do you suppose will accomplish more to slow and stop Trump? The Pentagon, state governments, courts, and civil rights organizations with their legal challenges and administrative knowledge? Or a couple hundred Lemmy warriors "storming" Chicago hunting podcasters and Illinois fascists who'll they'll magically identify and slaughter because you're all supheroes apparently? And that's assuming all of you aren't just talking just talking tough because it makes you feel good, which has odds of very slim to none. Even -if- you could and actually would, do not sabotage real efforts towards foiling Trump by killing or assaulting people (not to mention your lives). If a civil war breaks out and it's army vs. army that's different, but the US isn't near there yet and in the meantime you're trying to be the WW2 Allies without the army or mandate.

They already have “violent vigilante rhetoric”.

"They're evil so I should be allowed to do it too." Let's forget morality issues - in the context of murdering people like podcasters it doesn't even make sense to race to the bottom. It will accomplish almost nothing and cause a host of problems. Let's say miracles are real - you aren't full of crap, you don't get caught or killed, and you actually go murder Fuentes in cold blood or someone else like him. What do you honestly think the right's response is going to be? "Oh crap, we better stop hating"? Creating martyrs and millions of angry, fearful people with guns is not the path to a safe nation.

You know one of the reasons why they’re calling us “cucks”?

Oh no, the would-be rapists and fascists on the extreme right don't like me! ...Are you really trying to tell me you're upset about their insults? They can say whatever they want about me. Hell, you can too. I'm going to sleep just fine tonight without the approval of short-sided murder fetishists, regardless of whether they are your guys or Trump's.

I hope they tell me to use elevators to change floors again, or the magic is gone.

I too am a connoisseur of urinary tract infections. /s

why would their death be bad?

Because you don't have a crystal ball. You seem to think you can magically know for sure that premeditated murder of Fuentes would prevent suffering ("I support it if it does".) Forget legality, morally you shouldn't get to decide that someone dies because you "know" their death will prevent suffering. Like I said, what if other people decided whether to kill civilians based on that metric? Imagine if the "enemy within" extremist right start making decisions that way - they probably think you and people you want protected will harm their nation (and your willingness to seriously consider their murder wouldn't help). Especially when it's a podcaster, which again, is the origin of your argument as per your "silencing the voices" assertion that you'd somehow know when it would save "tens of millions".

let’s assume Stalin’s regime wasn’t fascist. What changes?

You using him as an example of Western fascism.

Pick one.

That's a moral decision, not a legal one. Like you say, policies can be determined by either. I think a person should get a trial where they can defend themselves and punishment can be administered equitably because of morality, not because it's in a book. If I had to rule a country, I would design a system for trials if none existed, i.e. not because of existing law. I wouldn't sign mob rule and vigilantism in law and then say it's alright because I made it legal. We're not going to agree. You think civilians murdering other civilians is not just a right but a moral obligation, I don't.

Why I don't support fascism: I'd support a war to unseat Hitler and the SS, but at that point it's not murder, it's combat. There would be moral boundaries in such an event. I would not support telling random people to march into a German newspaper and open fire on civilians in the hope they kill the right people to stop Hitler's rise. Which is the WW2-era equivalent of killing Fuentes in his podcast studio as a check to Trump.

Sorry to hear it. Sometimes the dogpile is real.

You’re lost - do you think fascism is good because Stalin wasn’t fascist?

Man, I'm done. You're strawmanning hard now. At what point did I say fascism is good? Can you please post the quote of me saying that? Don't just tell me I said it either, or that what I said means it even if it doesn't say it.

I can’t make this any simpler - I support it if it does.

Exactly! You support killing if YOU'RE sure it will prevent suffering. So if you have the opinion that killing Fuentes will prevent suffering, then you'll go ahead and kill him because as established, you only care about morality not law. I said "Can you imagine if your example cops were guided by your principles, ignored law, and killed everyone they suspected might be a dangerous criminal on the chance it would reduce suffering?" You said that wasn't true, that you don't support killing anyone you want, but simultaneously tell me you do want to kill people you think are future threats (if it does reduce suffering).

Get a dictionary. Look up fascism and communism

Webster's work for you?

• Fascism: populist political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual, that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, and that is characterized by severe economic and social regimentation and by forcible suppression of opposition.
• Communism: A: a system in which goods are owned in common and are available to all as needed. B: a theory advocating elimination of private property. C: a doctrine based on revolutionary Marxian socialism and Marxism-Leninism that was the official ideology of the Soviet Union.

Pretty sure you're looking at the fact that both are dictatorships and ignoring that fascism is hard right authoritarianism and communism is hard left authoritarianism. For starters, Stalin made private ownership a serious offense. Hitler supported private ownership. I even gave you an example of Stalin dissolving his Comintern - a move a fascist would never ever make. If I give you that they're similar in many meaningful respects, will you in turn concede there are important differences? #

tell me what I’ve mischaracterised

You told me that because I don't want to kill podcasters/journalists (not even leaders) that you "spit on the feigned outrage and moralism of someone whose prescriptions excuse the fucking Holocaust, and condemn intervention against it because it was legal - absolutely monstrous and utterly moronic." Because I think civilians deserve, at minimum, a trial before they are murdered doesn't mean I excuse the Holocaust. It's a huge overreach and a ridiculous take. I accuse you of bringing in that attack because you're outraged, wanted a strawman to support that outrage, and are at best slippery sloping me - not because I said that.

you’re saying it’s bad because it’s illegal

Dude, I stopped talking about legality the moment you made it clear you have no regard for the law. Since then it's been all about morality, which you say is your only compass.

Combatant is different. If this was a civil war or something similar (and thus ruled by laws of war) and someone was a combatant you'd be absolutely correct. But the people here are talking about killing a civilian, as civilians, while not at war, and without trial which is definitely murder.

Way to dodge the question about if you think killing social media people (not even Trump, just podcasters) is going to prevent WW3. That was half the comment and the whole point. You aren't talking about killing Hitler and Goebbels, you're talking about killing the newspaper writers in 1933 Germany and assuming no one else takes their place so their stance is "silenced". You talk about good faith arguments...

"Stalinism is the totalitarian means of governing and Marxist–Leninist policies implemented in the Soviet Union (USSR) from 1924 to 1953 by dictator Joseph Stalin and in Soviet satellite states between 1944 and 1953. Marxism–Leninism is a communist ideology that became the largest faction of the communist movement in the world in the years following the October Revolution. It was developed in Russia by Joseph Stalin and drew on elements of Bolshevism, Leninism, Marxism, and the works of Karl Kautsky." Stalin dissolved the Comintern, his "long arm of the Soviet state" during WW2. "Invoking the “judgment of the founders of Marxism and Leninism” as a kind of holy writ, the resolution renounces any reliance on “organizational forms that have outlived themselves.” I think you are confusing dictatorship and one-party states (ways of ruling) with fascism (political ideology).

Now you're strawmanning by putting words in my mouth and telling me what I believe. Nothing I've said is an excuse for the Holocaust and I've not once apologized for Nazis. If you really are intellectually honest you need to give me that. I've been exclusively arguing against your original stance that killing people (and we started by talking about Fuentes, a podcaster) is justified if you're sure it will prevent suffering, a stance you have reiterated as the greater good multiple times now.

Telling other people to commit premeditated murder is, and it's all over this thread + the original (which I think was taken down).

• I gave alternatives at the bottom about how to resist in a way that won't hand the right the justification/bogeyman they dream about, and get people killed (including a lot of the people talking big if they follow through on their words).
• I gave alternatives at the bottom (x2)
• I gave alternatives at the bottom (x3), including concrete examples of institutions/people already prepping resistance.
• You say "waah". I say luckily, almost all of you (probably 100%) won't do the killing you're so happy to push others to do. Tell me tough guy, when exactly are you personally planning on putting up instead of shutting up? I don't think you have and (again thankfully) I don't believe you will - I'm damn near positive you'll just ragepost and grumble about how you totally would have and how heroic that makes you. And to be very clear I definitely don't think you should even if you're mentally unbalanced enough to do so - if you start punching/killing people you'll just die or ruin your life + the whole cascade of violence thing.

If the post is too wordy (wordcounter.net places it at 2m10s for the average reader) for you to pay attention, consider sticking to downvoting, skipping it, and not commenting such easily rebutted points.

I'm not upset Bernie was criticized - no one should be above a good-faith critique and ideas should be judged on merit as opposed to who says them. The reason I disagree with Pelosi is that I think Sanders made some damn good points, and if the Dems don't listen they are going to fail again.

I really missed my deceased emotional support cat this week. (Don't feel bad, he lived an excellent life and was happy. I hope I get to say the same years down the road.)

Part 1: All of history from corporations becoming a thing to present day. # Part 2: The results of heartless corporate policy for the foreseeable future.

For a second I thought "self-ruling" = driven by one of those sovereign citizen idiots. You know, the kind that think they don't need license plates or to pay tickets because they are nations unto themselves. In which case it's almost a ghost car in that it's not guided by an intelligent life form. Then I saw the board.

I have yet to encounter an self-driving car (not yet legal in Canada) but it probably feels wild driving near one.

Thanks for clarifying that you also are talking about way more than just doxing. Which is the whole point of my post - it's disingenuous to argue, as he is, that it's "just doxing guys, why are you so upset?". You just gave supporting evidence.

Stalin as an example of a Western Fascist is ludicrously off the mark. Look up Fascism vs. Communism, and read about Hitler's relationship with Stalin - "Though they never met or even spoke, Hitler and Stalin loathed each other on political grounds. Both men hoped to buy time to prepare for the future Nazi-Soviet war they knew was inevitable." Mussolini's revolution killing tens of millions? You need to retake history and politics my dude.

As for Hitler, the numbers you are talking about aren't his takeover of Germany - they're WW2. Unless your argument is that killing Fuentes/other social media personalities is going to stop WW3 (and I have no idea what group of nations you think are going to full-blown war with the US because of Fuentes/others) you need to stop using "tens of millions" for harm prevention by "silencing" these dudes. It is, indeed, hyperbole.

Cops: You are are saying, over and over, that killing people to stop suffering is right. You are absolutely talking about killing people who are SAYING things you don't like. Fuentes is not an active shooter - I can't even find a criminal record for him of any kind. I can read what you write. "You kill the Nazi leader to stop the minorities getting murdered" - you want people you have decided are dangerous to die now to prevent possible future harm. Exactly what I wrote.

Whatever, I'm not going to challenge your morality anymore - it's clear you think you have a right to declare when someone deserves to die. You've made it clear you don't care about laws. I wrote a post hours ago that ignores morality completely (and most of legality) about the likely actual consequences of the vigilante war you and others are proposing. It's near the top of this thread if you want to read it.